Event Planning

Ronn’s Five Favorite Event-Planning Blogs

November 18, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

When I first started planning and attending events, my experience was bolstered by personal experience and conversations with friends, guests, and coworkers. Nowadays, there are so many blogs on the internet to to find. By connecting with these folks online, I am constantly inspired. It’s a way to keep educating myself.

Because there is so much content on the internet, I want to share my favorite blogs that I hope might be useful to you.

1. Event Manager Blog

Julius Solaris’ site has been a resource for event planners ever since its launch in 2007. Solaris is a professional speaker for the event industry focusing on event technology and trends. His expertise shows, proved by the thousands of event professionals worldwide who access the site everyday for its trending technology research, advice on how to use social media, and resources such as the “Event App Bible.”

2. Event Planning Blueprint

This site is another useful resource. Through an assortment of well-written, frequently updated blog posts, Melanie Woodward and other writers makes the event-planning industry and fun network to be a part of. Plus, the videos are clear and direct. And Melanie offers affordable options such as a Toolkit to purchase for solutions for your business.

3. BIZBASH

Bizbash has everything you need. It covers venues, suppliers, tools, and any ideas you may need for your upcoming event. Plus, the site provides an RSS feed of the latest news in the event planning world.

4. Jordan Kerney: Oh Happy Day!

If you’re in need of funky, creative inspiration, look no further than Jordan’s interior design and part blog. As they describe it, they put the “art” back it “party.” With an endless stream of gift and decor inspiration, any idea taken from this site is sure to be a huge party hit. You can either make your own items from printed out directions or purchase things from their online store.

Recommended article: Favorite Party Ideas

Survival Guide Continued

September 15, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

Let’s continue with our tips from last post about how to conserve your energy while running a long event.

Technology is your friend. If there is a way to notify your personnel when a VIP or speaker enters the room so they can ensure, first hand, the guest is having a good time, that could be very beneficial. Is there a way to send notifications when the next session of an event is about to start? If the venue is large, is there an interactive map that can plan the most efficient route?

On event days, if there is an opportunity to sit- take it! These opportunities are usually few and far between so don’t feel guilty about taking it. Give your staff time to rest also. Make sure there is a private area for them to switch off, even if only for a brief time period to freshen up or grab something to eat. If you are taking a break yourself, make sure someone can take over in your absence.

Don’t forget to eat. Water is your best friend and essential fuel, always, and especially on event days.

Think about any information you might need during the event. Make sure you’ll have access to these documents or schedules or phone numbers on the day of the event.

On the day of the event, there might be extra tasks that could easily get accomplished with a volunteer or two. Ask a friend or family member to come help out just in case. This is also like backup in case someone cannot make it on the day of the event.

It can help to break down the event into smaller events and delegate these to your support staff. It takes the whole burden off you or off one person.

Just in case there is a desired change on the day of the event, make sure you have commands for your staff so they are ready to execute.

After the event, if it is a multi day event, make sure to rest up each night so you’re not hating yourself in the morning. If it’s the actual end of the event, give yourself a pat on the back! Reward yourself for the hard work and successful event!

7 Elements that Make for a Great Corporate Party

August 17, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

Companies are starting to host corporate parties to for the purpose of networking and building customer relationships. According to a study, the meeting industry contributes $106 billion to the GDP (Gross Domestic Product).

A great way to plan a corporate event is to satisfy the following elements:

Vision: Prior to planning, clearly define the goals and objectives for the event by consulting with your client. Keep your notes about all conversations with vendors and with your client.
Budget: When setting a budget, be aware of the following: promotional/marketing expenses, venue rental, security, catering, alcohol, booklets, name tags, printing, paying for speakers or special guests, table décor, entertainment, photography, event insurance
Venue: Consider the size and location of the venue. Is it easy accessible? Will there be enough room for all the guests, comfortably? If the venue is outdoors, be sure to account for the weather.
Timeline: Create a schedule of events and share it will all vendors. This will encourage you to follow the schedule yourself. On your timeline you should include: venue set-up, guest arrival, cocktail and dinner serving times, speakers or presentation times, closing ceremonies, clean-up and any other details that are unique to each event
Décor: Develop a theme for the event, in accordance to the vision of your client. Check Pinterest for some ideas or color combinations. Are there any special touches you can add to make the event stand out.
Catering: Never skimp on the food, especially when planning a corporate party. The food should be of good quality and presented nicely. No one has time for bad food. Also try to offer a variety of foods to make sure there is something for everyone.
Entertainment: This can make or break an event. If you have music, make sure it compliments the theme of the party. If you have live music, listen to a sample before. Caricature artists, photographers and of course, psychics, can be great additions to the event.

Great Apps for Event Planners (including Weddings)

August 11, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

Organizing an event can be extremely rewarding. Whether the event is small and intimate, or large and filled with festivities, picking out the decorations, the colors in which to purchase decor and delegating the order of festivities so that they all fit together in an extremely fun and joyous occasion for others to enjoy can be very fulfilling!

Melanie Haselmayr, author of a Forbes article, shares some of her favorites tools to plan events that are fun for everyone. First is Pinterest. Pinterest is a great way to gather creative inspiration. There are thousands of images to spark ideas for your event. There are many images of event décor, design and themes.

Evernote makes taking notes and planning more organized. You can compile images, text and even web pages in Evernote. Each can be categorized and tagged as well.

Slack is an easy and effective method of communication. It is essentially an email in text form, allowing communication among anyone else part of your planning team including outside vendors.

If you want to share photos among a large number of people, tell them to download Capsule and upload their photos there. Capsule allows sharing of photos for everyone!

If everyone needs to coordinate a meeting, Doodle provides a way for many people to plug in times that work and don’t work and then spits out potential times that work for everyone.

Planning Pod is designed for event planners and offers over two dozen event-management tools. It is intended to compile all planning details in one space. Blossom is a project-management tool designed to share parts of your planning with certain people. It was originally designed to keep track of product development at tech companies but serves well for managing events too. You can create “cards” for each event task and move them to a different stage once the task is completed. You can even add a “client approval” step.

Bizzabo is a way to add tickets and invitations to a website. It also keeps track of what people are saying on social media about your event. On the day of the event, the app allows for pushing notifications to attendees about any delays or changes to the program.

Event Venues in SF

June 19, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

Psychic Readings by Ronn

Hotel Zephyr: Davidson Hotels & Resorts completely revamped the Radisson Fisherman’s Wharf this spring, transforming it into an upscale property, Hotel Zephyr. There are 361 waterfront guest quarters. Dawson Design Associates redesigned the hotel and included recycled corrugated metal, cargo containers, upcycled nautical materials and shipping crates. The event space holds 350 people for receptions or can seat about 230 people. There is a game room that seats 50.

Psychic Readings by Ronn

Dirty Water: Dirty Water, a 6,252 square foot restaurant and bar, is located in the ground floor of Twitter’s building. The venue has a lounge in addition to the bar and dining areas; it was designed by Arcsine. The menu is planned to include paleo-style cuisine with rare game and foraged vegetables, an extensive wine and whiskey list and 52 beers on tap, five of those ales to be brewed on site. The decor includes a wood burning stove and lots of leather, dark wood and colorful glass.

Psychic Readings by Ronn

Harvest Inn by Charlie Palmer: This wine country kitchen incorporating ingredients naturally sourced from Napa Valley opened in May. The space is airy and has alfresco dining terraces. The 110 seat restaurant accommodates for both small groups and large dinner parties or cocktail receptions. The restaurant can fit up to 250 guests with outdoor terraces for 20-25. There is a private dining room called the Vineyard View Room that is decorated slightly more elegantly with beamed ceilings, oak plank flooring, a large central stone fireplace and panoramic views of Whitehall Lane’s Leonardini Vineyard and the Mayacamas Mountains.

Event Planning Apps

May 21, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

I can’t disagree with the experts. While the existence of advancing technology and party planning applications doesn’t necessitate their use, it is a certain convenience that these budding avenues show such promise of smoothing over the arduous process of putting together an event? If offered the opportunity to streamline the most sticky and slow-moving parts of event planning, one would be remiss to not ignore it. In an earlier post, I mentioned the benefits of SharedIt, an app that allows users to share their experiences with others while immersed in the moment, but what if we go behind the scenes? How do we expedite the tolling task of constructing and managing the scaffold of a party itself? How can we innovate to juggle the many variables in the equation? Older methods of compiling data through manual entry into spreadsheets eat up large portions of time that could be better spent elsewhere. Shuffling between separated and unorganized programs and files can plainly become annoying and can diminish work performance diverting us from our greater potential.

Introducing Pro Party Planner released by Zysco: costing only the price of a single-use notebook and a pack of post-it notes, this new application combines all the capabilities of an office desk into one convenient package with a modest and navigable interface. Packed with guest and party-specific timelines (from seating arrangements to RSVP updates), checklists to oversee orders of anything from food to furnishings, overviews of the party budget, and Facebook syncing features, the app doesn’t overlook any of the essential components of assembly. From big-picture to fine detail, the app walks you through the set-up of your event. Consider it the king of both the lay of the land, and its logistics.

Pro Party Planner is featured on all the lists of the top applications, and shows an impressive majority of 5-star reviews. For small events such as a weekend birthday party at a restaurant and for large events with hundreds of guests such as a wedding with full catering service I would choose Pro Party Planner.

The Backstage of Event Management

January 30, 2015 by Ronn Sussberg

Planning-an-event — The key to planning a great event is making sure not to bite off more than you can chew.

Event management is undoubtedly an exciting job – it has the pace, the people, the adrenaline, the glitz and of course, the post-success euphoria that only a job well done can inspire. From afar, the allure is quite understable, and often even encouraged by those who would very much like it believed that their lives are indeed all about looking glamorous, meeting exciting new people and travelling from one place to the next with the sole mission of delivering yet another wonderful event.

Of course not all event managers work with celebrities and organize Oscars. Most, like the author who shares her experience in this article, are people working events that may not be as large-scale, but come with the same kinds of woes and risks. All event managers share the post-success euphoria, but where they truly bond is in the dark underbelly of an event amidst the chaos of missed deadlines, electrical failures, budget cuts and staff shortages.

Most experts agree that the foundation of organizing a successful event, be it a suburban birthday party or the Super Bowl halftime show, the key to success most definitely lies in proper planning. Another article that explores the common mistakes made in event planning, identifies the key elements of planning for a successful event. Aside from having a structure to the whats, whos, whys and whens of the event, it is also essential to set realistic aims for the project that takes into consideration factors like location, budget, time frame and staff efficiency.

Check out part II for details on how to balance logistics with the desire to throw an amazing event.

Don’t Make Your Event a Snooze: Choosing the Right Entertainment

October 4, 2013 by Ronn Sussberg

weddingsinger — Choose your event entertainment carefully!

There are a lot of factors to consider when planning an event. The food, the venue, the guest list. With everything that goes into an event, the entertainment can sometimes be overlooked, or worse, booked blindly. A recent blog post on Empire CLS gives a pretty decent rundown on how to make sure your event is a hit. Here are a few of the highlights:

Making sure the entertainer is right for the crowd is one of the most important parts of your selection. A Metallica cover band might be great for your backyard 4th of July BBQ, but probably not the best choice for your daughter’s rehearsal dinner. Before booking any entertainment, make sure you ask yourself the question, “who is this for?” If the answer is you instead of your guests, you may want to reconsider.

The real pros of the event entertainment industry know all the right questions, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t know them too. Make sure you ask all the nitty gritty, logistical questions. If you hire a 10 piece band, make sure they have access to a sufficient power source or your guests could be partying acoustic and in the dark. Try to envision your event in your head and think about the actual logistics. These are the types of things that make a seamless party or event, but are still often overlooked.

Also make sure you find out how long a performer’s show usually lasts. For example, if you’re throwing a birthday party for a younger child, you probably shouldn’t make fifty 5 year olds sit through an hour long magic show. Know what type of event you want to have. If the entertainment is the centerpiece of the event it’s okay to have your guests sit and watch a performance, but if it’s the type of event where people want to mingle and socialize, avoid tethering your guests to the performer.

These are just a few thought starters for choosing your event entertainment. If you’re looking for that extra edge for your party, hiring a psychic to give mini readings to your guests is a great way to set your event apart from the pack.

Thanks for reading and be sure to check back soon for more news and advice on planning your next event.

HGTV’s Tips for Planning a Low Stress Party

September 23, 2013 by Ronn Sussberg

Party Planning — Replacing a sit down dinner with plenty of light fare is a great way to take the stress out of planning a party.

If you ask me, adding a psychic medium to your next party is a great way to give your soiree a unique flare that your guests will remember. While that’s a no-brainer, there are still plenty of other things to consider when trying to plan a great get together. Planning a party is all about fun, which is the most important thing to remember. If you’re too stressed out to enjoy your own party, your guests won’t have fun either. At leasts that’s what HGTV’s party planning guide says. If you have a party coming up, this is a great resource to check out. Here are a few highlights:

Give it a Theme

Everyone loves a good theme party. A theme will also help guide your efforts while planning. Shopping for a standard party can be overwhelming. A theme will help you streamline your food, decoration, and entertainment options. It will also set your event apart from the average dinner party or backyard cookout. Make sure not to go overboard, though. Choose a theme that is inclusive and that will allow guests to enjoy themselves no matter how involved in the theme they choose to get.

Self Serve Bar

This one seems pretty obvious, but it is important to remember. Many hosts get caught up waiting on their guests hand and food. Setting up a classy, self-serve bar will allow guests to help themselves and experiment with different concoctions. More importantly, it will keep you from running around serving drinks all night.

Bag the Dinner

Keeping the food at your party simple will almost always help you and your guests have a better time. By having plenty of appetizers and hors d’oeuvres you’ll save yourself the stress of preparing a formal meal. This kind of light fare also encourages more socializing.

These are just a few easy tips for destressing your next party. Check out the whole article for the full list.

Thanks for stopping by. Come back soon for more party and event planning news and tips and remember Ronn is available for live appearances at your next get together.